Tag Archives: culture

Artist Glenn Ligon‘s “Double America 2” is among the most profound works of contemporary American art, and it is profoundly American. It’s absolutely brilliant.

The artwork can read on several levels. At its core is the idea of there being two different Americas or American experiences largely due to race, and, more pointedly, to racism, discrimination and its place in the nation’s history.

It points to the psychology of identity, the sense of black and white, rich and poor, haves and have-nots, exterior image and interior reality, something bright — and brightly lit — and ideal versus something gravely wrong, upside down, dark and flickering.

We’ve seen this artwork several times over the years elsewhere in museums around the U.S. and the world. We recently viewed it at the Broad Museum in Los Angeles (pictured here). It’s the first time we’ve seen Ligon’s artwork since the U.S. Presidential campaign and election of Donald Trump, an event that brought the startling breadth of the nation’s cultural, economic, racial and political divides into the sharpest focus.

Epic street art mural by the international renowned street-artist duo known as the London Police (TLP) in Amsterdam’s Jordaan neighborhood. The artwork features the circle-headed, smiley-faced TLP graphic character called “the Lad.”

We recently visited the South Beach, Miami studios of artist-designer Laz Ojalde and took pictures of the space and his work, which includes these lights and objet. Ojalde runs a separate design studio called LMNOQ and has developed an aesthetic around sustainable, minimalist furniture design and art pieces. Super dope stuff.